Business Consulting: Marginless Business Strategy

• John Vandivier

Marginal costs are a major component of business costs. This article will address specific techniques and technologies which can be used to eliminate marginal costs for businesses. Collectively, these points create a business strategy which I am a huge fan of which is a minimal margin business strategy. These techniques alone won't do the trick, but ultimately the idea is a completely marginless business model.

  1. Leverage freelancers.
    1. Rather than paying hired labor which involves marginal cost, hire freelancers on a project basis with no residual commitment. Recommended sites to hire a freelancer include Freelancer and Fiverr, but you can also use social media and sites not specifically for freelancers such as Craig's List, Reddit, and more. Also check with Google.
    2. Airtasker is another relevant platform. I've yet to use this service. Here's a blurb on the platform: \"Airtasker is a trusted community platform that connects people who need to outsource tasks and find local services, with people who are looking to earn money and ready to work.\"
  2. Utilize Open Source technologies.
    1. In addition to being marginless, open source technology is also free. This great article highlights open source technologies able to take care of a wide range of business functions including accounting, customer relationship management (CRM), productivity, enterprise resource planning (ERP), ecommerce, and more.
  3. Utilize technologies with nonrecurring costs.
    1. Looking over the article I linked in the section on Open Source Technologies, you may have noticed Wordpress. Wordpress is a great, free, open source tool which has an amazing array of plugins which can suit your business needs. It also has paid plugins which may be paid for marginlessly, or without recurring payment, even though they can displace functionality which is usually the preview of a recurring payment service. Wordpress is only one example, although it is the best example I would point to, of a high-quality, free, open source platform which can be further extended through the use of paid plugins.
    2. Using customized Wordpress sites with a variety of plugins may be better more effective than utilizing a wide variety of open source technologies because the Wordpress plugins are integrated.
    3. Some examples of Wordpress plugins include:
      1. Employee management
      2. Project management (Bye bye Basecamp).
      3. Time tracking (later Harvest).
      4. Email Services (No thanks, Mailchimp).
      5. Job Boards / Hiring Management (This one is cool too).
      6. And more!
  4. Ditch the traditional office.
    1. Renting office space or purchasing a property which requires a loan is a major source of marginal cost. Embrace working online or from your personal home. If you need a physical space try to utilize shared productive space or shared office space at an ad hoc, rather than monthly, rate. You can even look to a small town restaurant to rent out a room weekly or monthly for meetings. Shared space services may also provide things like internet access, coffee, printing services, and more for free, discounted, and/or marginless rates. Just do a Google search for services in your area. In my area, examples of shared space services include:
      1. Cove
      2. Connect113